The Security Council and security decision-making

WithEdwin Bacon

This chapter presents an overview of the Security Council of the Russian Federation. It considers formal status and membership of the Security Council, the apparatus that serves the Security Council, the role of Secretary of the Security Council, the history of the Security Council, and the Council’s assessment of threats to Russian security. The chapter explores a more behaviourist analysis of the influence of Russia’s Security Council, and its Secretary, in Russia’s political and security affairs today. Russia’s Security Council is an organ of the Russian state whose existence is set out in Russia’s Constitution. Russia’s Security Council, having waxed and waned in significance over more than quarter of a century in existence, now stands in the first rank of Russia’s institutions. By bringing together the top officials from across the executive, legislature, judiciary, regions, and security services, under the leadership of the President, it occupies a uniquely influential political space for the consolidation of decision-making.